Fly, Phoenix, Fly - Herobrine x Reader

Chapter Three - Obsess

Y/N slumped forward onto the bed, burying her face in the sheets and muffling a scream.

"Feel better?" Meryl sank down on the edge of the bed, patting her friend's back in between her wings.

"No." Y/N groaned. "What is wrong with him?? We see each other for the first time in forty years and he- he all but ignores me! I would think maybe he'd just forgotten about me if he hadn't made a considerable effort to avoid traveling with me!"

"Well, us." Meryl corrected. "But unless he has some serious problem with me that I'm unaware of, yes, I would say he's avoiding you."

Y/N sighed, turning her head to stare at the wall of the guest bedroom that they had been assigned. Herobrine had taken them (with little more than a word) up to the third floor of the castle where the queen's guests would reside. He had offered them each a room, but they had decided to share.

The room was just as lavish as one would expect for a castle, with rich furnishings that included a king-sized bed. The tall, narrow windows had panels of blackout curtains to block out the ambient lava-light from outside, and a glowstone lamp in the ceiling could be switched on and off at the press of a button. Y/N had also finally gotten her answer as to how the Nether told time - a 24-hour clock hung on the far wall, which currently read 18 hours. Y/N could only assume that such clocks were synchronized throughout at least the capital, if not the surrounding areas as well.

"Just because he's not talking to you doesn't mean you can't talk to him," Meryl pointed out.

"Yes, well, what am I supposed to say?" Y/N grumbled. "'Hi, I know it's been forty years since you rejected me and told me there's no hope of us being together, that you'd rather disappear into the Nether forever, but I'm still in love with you so please give me another chance'? Notch, no."

"Hmm." Meryl mused over this for a moment. "It's quite possible that he has a good idea how you feel, and is trying to... preemptively drive you off?"

"Maybe." Y/N recalled the moment that she had first recognized him on the platform, and her cheeks flushed red. "Ugh, I'm in trouble."

"You are." Meryl gave her a final pat, then stood up. "I'm going to get ready for bed."

"Alright." Y/N's mournful gaze remained focused on the wall as Meryl crossed the room to change.

Y/N had no idea how she was supposed to act on this mission. The thought of traveling with Herobrine, just like she had forty years before, and just accepting the silent treatment that he was giving her seemed too painful to endure. On the other hand, to be rejected again would be far worse. At least back then he had felt something for her, what if now he truly did not care? After all, he had been in a position to contact her, at least tell her that he was safe, for nearly as long as he had been gone - and, since Commander Zenith was here on a fairly regular basis, Y/N could only assume that Herobrine had specifically sworn him to secrecy.

"I suppose I could talk to him about... something unrelated." She finally muttered. "About our mission, or something. At least get a feel for how he thinks of me." She waited a beat, then, when Meryl didn't respond, Y/N lifted her head to find out what had captured her friend's attention.

Meryl had removed her robes, now dressed only in the dark gray jumpsuit that made up the inner layer of their uniforms. Her top was unbuttoned halfway down, and she was staring into the full-length mirror at the raised, darkened marks that riddled her chest.

Quietly, Y/N rose from the bed, crossing the room to stand beside her. The scars on her chest were the only remaining sign of the night that Meryl was brutally murdered, stabbed a dozen times and her body left for Y/N to find in their meeting place. Meryl remembered bits and pieces of the event - and, from the way she had described it, it had at least been quick. But no death was bearable, especially one where she had been set upon in a place that should have been safe and given no chance to fight back.